Toh 587, Toh 943 — The Quintessence of “The Great Peahen”

Notes

1. We translate this having the very common Sanskrit expression namaḥ samanta­buddhānām apratihata­śāsanānām in mind. The Tibetan in this form would mean something like “to the Buddha who teaches without opposition from anywhere.”

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2. We prefer this form, that of the Compendium of Dhāraṇīs version. The Tantra version has piśuni. The meaning is something like “slanderer” (fem.). Such opprobrious epithets are not uncommon for deities.

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3. Here, too, we side with the version in the Compendium of Dhāraṇīs. The Tantra version names the parent text as The Essence (snying po) of The Great Peahen, but this cannot be the case. Instead of what we translate here as “to uphold” to capture the ambiguity of the original, Tatakaragupta, when discussing a similar dhāraṇī said to encapsulate The Perfection of Wisdom in One Hundred Thousand Lines (see The Dhāraṇī of “The Perfection of Wisdom in One Hundred Thousand Lines,” Toh 576/932),Śatasāhasrikā­prajñā­pāramitā­dhāraṇī (Toh 576/932). is more explicit when he replaces the verb with kaṇṭhasthīkṛ (“to place it in one’s throat”), which is the Sanskrit idiom for “to learn by heart.” He also spells out the benefit as the “meritorious karmic fruit” (puṇyaphala) of memorizing the parent text. This sentence is then followed by a fascinating short discussion, which merits to be quoted in full: “Surely, this is an exaggeration! No, one should not say this. For countless thus-gone ones have empowered this dhāraṇī to serve as a method for gaining the equipment of merit for women, immature people, and simpletons, as well as for learned people whose minds are confused, just like the pole of a snake charmer[, which is preprepared by the expert snake charmer to be effective even when he is no longer present,] for removing poison; however, it is not a method for gaining the knowledge conveyed by The [Perfection of Wisdom in] One Hundred Thousand Lines. This should be understood to apply in other cases [i.e., where the text is abbreviated into a dhāraṇī] as well” (nanv atyuktir eveti. na caitad vaktavyam. yataḥ strībāla­mūrkhān paryākuli­tamatīn paṇḍitān praty api puṇya­saṃbhārasādhana­tvenā­saṃkhyeya­tathāgatair adhiṣṭhi­teyaṃ dhāriṇī, yathā viṣaharatvena gāruḍikaṃ stambhaḥ; na tu lakṣāprati­pādita­jñāna­sādhana­tvena. evam anyatrāpi boddhavyaḥ). In his note to this dhāraṇī, he reiterates the point about “to uphold” meaning “to memorize” and promises as the reward the fruit of reciting the text (pāṭhaphala).

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